


Blue In The Face

by dollfire



Category: The Binding of Isaac (Video Game)
Genre: Child Abuse, Drama, For some reason I thought up the idea of the Deadly Sins being the children of Satan, Gen, No spoilerinos but ??? sticks out like a sore thumb in here, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2020-01-27
Packaged: 2020-06-30 00:09:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19841413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollfire/pseuds/dollfire
Summary: ???, or as he prefers to be called, Blue Baby, has lived with the Devil's family for as long as he can remember. Adopted, sure, but that's beside the point. He never thought about his origins, or why he always came off as the weird part of the family.That is, until everything is halted due to the unexpected arrival of a sniveling little boy.





	1. Sunday Services

**Author's Note:**

> in case it's not obvious already, i've never posted or written a fanfic in my life  
> lord forgive me for what i'm boutta do

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Don't you just hate being woken up by your dad- I mean, boss?

There comes a time and place in your life where you get used to being called in early by your boss.  
It could be for a positive or negative reason, but sometimes, it can be purely by accident. Usually, my boss gets too loud and wakes somebody up. Mostly when he shoots a loud and dangerous beam of blood at the wall. Are bosses supposed to do that? Do bosses up there even live in their employees homes or anything like that?  
Well, I wouldn’t know. I’ve never dealt with a boss besides the one I’ve had all my life, or what’s left of my life.  
And that fucker just woke me up.

“Satan,” I mumble, rubbing my eyes and walking into his personal lair, “what’s with all the laughing? Did you stain the wall again?”  
A quick look at the obsidian wall says he didn’t. Good for us.  
He shuffles something in his hands. “Oh, it’s nothing.” He moves some of his left hand to reveal “NATIONAL NEWS: HUNDREDS DEAD IN..” with nothing else visible. He’s got some real big hands.  
I get closer for a better look. Upon closer inspection, Satan’s taking a look at a front-page article on a newspaper he gets from the human world. He gets it from Little Horn every Sunday. And every Sunday, we have to clean up a Brimstone mess off the walls and flooring.  
“I’m not sure those dead trees with ink on them classify as nothing. What’s on the news today, Satan?”  
His modest smile turns into a grin.  
“Hundreds of humans were killed in a jet crash,” he starts reading, “A total wipe of the passengers. Most of the victims were big in the banking and finance sector. I’ll have a real busy day today.” He skims through the rest of the paper to hunt for more tragedy and death, and I sit next to him on his desk while he does it. He flips through the pages quickly, skipping over articles about scams and corporate statistics (Greed’s favorites), politics (Pride’s favorite), even the more taboo tabloid topics relating to sexual content (Lust’s favorite). And Satan loves taboos. I decide to try and make conversation with him.  
“Any other juicy scoops?”  
He looks disappointed when he closes up the paper. “No, just a bunch of politics, financial reviews and good news.” It’s very rare to see the devil himself pout, but I saw it right there. “Don’t they have anything interesting to discuss besides a plane crash? Not even pictures of mourners provide me with dopamine!”  
I shuffle in my seat a bit. It’s awkward whenever the Devil says something like that, because me and my colleagues have to come up with something to distract his pessimism. “Well, think about it,” I try to reassure him, “you can wreak lots of havoc and destruction down here without batting an eye, better than bad luck ever could for those mortals.” For good measure, I put a hand on his very broad shoulder.  
“..You’re correct, but it’s not the same,” he starts feeling sorry for himself again, “It’s much more enjoyable to watch mortals writhe and die, especially when I know they’ll be in my palms sooner than later!”  
The pouting continues. This is gonna be difficult.  
“Well, Father,” I say in a more agreeable tone he likes, “You could always find a way to make new things to maim, smash and kill. Even strengthen your rule, if you want. Who can stop you from doing that?”  
His pout's already smaller. I'm getting into his skin. “You’re the Dark Lord, you own everything in this place. Sheol, The Depths, those caves, that drab brown dunny close to the surface-“  
“I don’t know what purpose that chamber serves, but it could be utilized for later,” he responds to that last little bit of encouragement. The pout he had is gone now, replaced with a thoughtful neutral face. “Go on, tell me of my great possibilities.”  
“You could swarm and conquer all of this underworld with your army and your own damned power,” I egg him on, “Even places you thought you never could. What about that big cathedral up above us? I bet it’d be a great place for meeting and rallying for your guards. We could get rid of that holiness somehow. What’s Jesus and his angels got on us?”  
His goat ears perk up, his neutral face completely shed. He looked like a million bucks, as if he didn’t remember the depression he got from the newspaper. “An excellent idea, my child!” he exclaims, nearly shooting Brimstone out the mouth and beaming from horn to horn. He gives me a firm and fatherly pat on the head. “What gave you such an idea?”  
“An unhappy lord is a slacking kingdom,” I tell him, “and an unhappy kingdom is a slacking lord.” Like a little kid at a grammar contest.  
“Great choice of words, my boy! I shall get to catching up with the mortal death toll at once!” He continues riding the high of my pipe dream suggestions, not noticing me hopping off the desk and leaving through the doorway. Just when I'm about to head in the direction of my room, he notices my absence.  
“Wait a moment!”  
I sigh and go back to the doorway. “Yes, sir?”  
“I’m terribly sorry for waking you up,” he apologizes, settling down in a more professional posture. “You may return to bed now.”  
“Thanks,” I answer him, turning back around and waving behind me while I kept on walking to where I came from.  
“You’re welcome, Bobby,” he calls after me. “Or do you still prefer Blue Baby?”


	2. Cry Yourself to Sleep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh no.

I couldn’t get back to sleep that fast when I was in my bed again that night. I just couldn’t.

Something as simple as a name drop from the Devil was like an adrenaline shot to the brain, and I was rattling internally from the entire conversation. Satan never calls me by my actual name. “Child” or “The dead one” has always been his go-to moniker for me. But my real name? Going as far back as calling me _Bobby_ ? Why start doing that shit now, in the earliest hours of the morning? Does he actually _need_ to sleep?  
“Okay,” I think to myself, “you’re overthinking this. What you need is rest, or at least a three hour nap.”  
I start laying down, trying to calm myself. I was exhausted from just having to talk with him, so I was looking forward to seeing nothing but black once more for a few hours.  
“Time to get to it, I guess.”

It takes me some time to “get to it”. In fact, I barely start "getting to it" before I meet some complications.  
When I try to lay down and drift off, the sound of gurgling and bed-creaking out of the tiniest bit of movement from me or my seven other siblings makes me feel restless. I have to move and remove my blanket a few times, because it's cold, but then all of the extra heat makes me feel too hot. I try the different sleeping positions; sideways left, on the back, sideways right, and then on the stomach. Sideways is almost comfortable, but my legs are already feeling numb without staying still for even ten minutes, so I decide on the back was the best method. Now all I need to do is trick myself into drifting out of consciousness.  
My thoughts are jumbled up and confused, so the conclusion I came to was to not think about anything. Nothing at all. If pure blankness fails me, I’d just have to think boring, like Satan’s rants about what an asshole God is, or the scratches and imperfections on the floor of my room. After a single test, I can confirm this is the best method; it took me 10 minutes to drift off after trying. Good thing I don’t have normal eyes.

* * *

I don’t smell anything. Or feel anything. Everything’s blank when you sleep, unless you’re dreaming or seeing demons while you sleep.  
I don’t know whether I’m just seeing things in my bedroom or not, but I’m sitting in a void, staring at this.. kid. This little kid. He’s not wearing anything, he’s not carrying anything, hell, he’s not even saying anything. All he’s doing is staring at me. Vacant expression on his face. Looking like he wants to say something, but doesn’t know how to.  
“Uh..”  
He keeps staring.  
“Hi there,” I spit out, confused with the elephant in the room standing in front of me, “where’d you.. come from?”  
He doesn’t open his mouth. He points up to the ceiling. It would’ve been ebony stone with discoloring, but the void made it nothing but black. I have no idea why he doesn’t talk, but I feel there’s a reason for it. Maybe a hallucination, but if it’s a dream, I’d rather keep it going than wake up again; dealing with this instead of falling back asleep after another hour is a better alternative.  
“The void? You came from the void?”  
He shakes his head, a frown on his face. He walks up to my arm, grabs it with his tiny little left hand, and points up again, still staring. I don’t like it one bit.  
“You mean that- how do you know that’s not a void? You don’t even seem like you’re from here. Who are you, kid?”  
He's visibly frustrated, making a noise similar to a grunt before jumping up and down, still holding onto my arm. He immediately freezes dead in his tracks when there’s foreshock in the ground. That’s what I thought, until I heard something screeching.  
“ _ISAAC!_ ”  
It sounds angry. Very, very angry. I stand and look up, down, all around. Nothing there that could kill me, just an endless void with me and this kid. I take another look at him, thinking he’d have the answer to all this. He looks like he isn't aware of the giant void all around him, so this should be easy. He should be calm, right?  
He’s crying his eyes out. His eyes go from black with a speck of white to almost entirely white, clouding with nonstop tears. Now I’m standing, and he’s slowly sinking down into a sitting posture, sniffling.  
I take back what I said about Satan being hard.

Whatever the hell just yelled that name is loudly stomping around, I have no idea what the hell is going on, and this little kid is leaking like a squeezed sponge. No way out of this now, I guess. Just have to hope I’m waking up soon.  
I’m still standing, and now the staring’s vice versa. He looks like he wants to shrink and hide somewhere, but I want answers before he can do that. Dreaming about interrogating children could be something to talk about at the breakfast table in a few hours, right?  
“Is that thing saying your name,” I question him, “or is there another little kid like you here?”  
He picks his head up a little. He’s not looking at me, but he nods, still wet with tears on his face. Good enough.  
“Isaac. Your name is-”

“ ** _ISAAC! COME BACK HERE, RIGHT NOW! YOU’RE NOT GETTING OUT OF THIS!_** "  
Isaac whimpers and buries himself into his knees, until I can’t see his face. He’s weeping louder and louder, and I just learned something new about him; he’s running away.  
“That’s your mother?”  
Isaac isn’t paying attention to my questions anymore. He’s crying, crying, crying, no end in sight, his hands clasped together, above his knees. He’s whispering, praying for something, anything to make this stop. The cynic in me wants to call him an idiot, but it’s better to encourage him. Easier to get answers that way.  
“Look, kid, it’s okay, you’re okay here. I’m not gonna hurt you, alright? You can tell me what it is.” I get a little closer to him.  
He flinches and sinks even deeper into fetal position on the floor, every little noise around him driving him to tears.  
“No, really,” I’m trying to reassure him, “I’ll even tell you my name. I’m-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i should clarify before we keep going that blue baby is different than isaac here. like they aren't the same person  
> if you're really confused, just remember the brother bobby familiar and how similar it looks to ???/blue baby


	3. I Just Want Some Breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blue Baby wakes up from a strange and vivid nightmare. To make matters worse, he's starving. Fortunately, shenanigans while waiting for the morning meal help him feel a little better.  
> But not by much.

Not talking to Isaac anymore. I’m awake, in an entirely different position than when I fell asleep, and I feel like shit.

I sit up, but end up laying back down for a few minutes, just staring at the ceiling and thinking about everything that just played out in my sleep.

I have no idea why my brain conjured up a kid named Isaac, or a mother to stomp around looking for him. Shouting until he's devastated and crying on the floor. I don't know why he was breaking down crying like that, I hear yelling like that all the time here. Nothing on the level of what he dealt with, but Satan does get pretty loud, even when he's not angry.

He's.. never had to stomp around looking for me, though. Then, my brain wandered to something worse.

Was she trying to-

"Alright, screw it," I mumble under my breath, "that's enough of that." Sitting in bed thinking about bad dreams isn't gonna help me forget them. It usually has the opposite effect. I don't have time to think about things like-

"Wait.. what time is it now?" There’s no sun or moon in Sheol, but you can usually tell by the time on the kitschy clocks Satan bought and put everywhere when it’s time to go to bed or when it’s time to wake up. Sitting up and looking at the reverse cross clock on the wall, it’s only 8:22 in the morning. Good thing I didn’t oversleep.

I shimmy out from under the covers and walk towards the “dining room”. It’s to the left of the Devil’s personal lair, in front of my room, and to the right of the stairs where everyone else’s rooms are. It’s just a wide stone table with eight smaller seats and one big seat for Satan, and a tiny little kitchen, where Gluttony (with the help of Satan) makes the goods, and then we eat the goods. Ravenously. For better or worse, the kitchen has a door, and the door is usually locked when anything is being made there. To prevent interruptions or damage from outside forces, you see. But that’s beside the point, since all the action takes place in the dining room.  
Going through the entrance is like walking into a school cafeteria; everyone’s having their own miniature conversations and picking on each other. The door to the kitchen is already closed, so everyone awake is just waiting for the grub to arrive.  
We all have unwritten assigned seats, so I sit in mine, right in the middle of Sloth and Greed. It takes a second for some of them to notice me sitting there. “Hey there, Baby,” Lust greets me first, drumming her fingers on an empty bowl, “How’d ya sleep?” She’s staring at me longingly, like I was her soulmate. She does it with everybody, even her own siblings. When I don’t say anything immediately, she looks at me like I’m giving her the silent treatment.  
“Fine, just fine,” I answer after daydreaming. I see Isaac in the front of my mind, so I try to get rid of him by distracting myself. “It’s pretty hard to not sleep well when you don’t have open eyes.”  
“Oh, really? I never knew that.”  
“Which part, not having normal eyes or being able to sleep better because of it?”  
She doesn’t have time to answer. Everybody currently present is intrigued by the talk, drowning out any possible response or flirtation from her.

“Makes sense to me, broad,” Greed pipes up to the right of me, “if he can’t blink ‘em, he can’t just.. open ‘em. I’m pretty sure that’s how it works, but I ain’t a doctor.”  
“Guess you could say that,” I ponder out loud. Sure didn't expect the first topic of the day to be centered around my X-shaped eyes.  
“I wouldn’t trust that kind of decree from a man with stitched-open eyes,” utters an asshole, also known as Pride. “My eyes don’t have any pupils or scleras, but I can blink and sleep perfectly without them.” He sits straight up, looking proud.  
Greed shot him a sour look.“Who even asked you about your eyes, smartass?”  
“You say an error, I will correct it. What’s wrong with that? You’re the oldest one out of all of us, and yet you make such amateur mistakes,” he chides, every word peppered with smugness.  
“What error? You just _love_ hearing yourself talk, don’tcha?”  
“Dere’s no need to be rude,” a shabby-looking Sloth speaks up, pecking away at food that didn’t exist yet. “You don’t gots the right to do ‘dat, Pride.”  
Every time Sloth opens his mouth, Pride looks as if he just contracted an intestinal parasite just by listening and looking. He always looks like that; if Sloth doesn’t have a slackjaw, he’s drooling out God knows what. Pride’s right eye twitches, but he recovers with a fake grin.  
“If I couldn’t offer feedback on mindless discussions at the table, I wouldn’t know what I’d do in this family,” he keeps up the bravado. “You have no right to talk back to me like that when you've nothing going on in that head of yours.”  
It’s fortunate that he’s right for once, because Pride enjoys putting the hurt on when his ego gets damaged. Before either of them can keep on with their jovial discussion, someone starts coming downstairs.  
My freshly roused-from-sleep brain panics when I think about the creature that stomped and screeched in my dream, but I tell myself there’s no way that thing I heard was real. What’s real is that there’s no food and I’m hungry. And the big-eyed masked man that just showed up in the dining room.  
“Uh, g-good morning. Can any of you tell me what’s gonna b-be for..breakfast?”  
It’s Wrath, sleep-deprived and pent up. Nothing out of the ordinary for him.  
“Not yet, bud.” Greed sits back in his chair and impatiently taps on the table, “It ain’t ready yet. You’re welcome to join us in line, though.”  
Wrath blinks in response, a mouth line of disapproval showing in his mask.  
“Wh-what were you guys talking about? Y’know, before I came down here.”  
Pride points to me, not interested in dealing with Sloth any longer. “How his eyes work. Nothing of much value.”  
“Really?”  
“Yeah,” I confirm, “Just killing time until food shows up, basically.”  
“You guys.. Think up s-some weird topics,” he answers as he got cozy in his chair. Right next to Lust. She flutters her eyelashes.  
“There you are,” she suggestively eyes him. “How’d you sleep last night?”  
“N-not very well,” he looks downward, not noticing her weird gesture.“The only way I could get myself to sleep was..was to blow something up first. It helps. It helps a lot.”  
Under the table, I feel some legs kicking at me. Guessing who it is, I try not to give it much attention; if it keeps Wrath from exploding, I can deal with it. While we keep encouraging time passage with various methods, Lust catches onto something.  
“Say, Wrath,” Lust pipes up again, “the seat to your left is empty. Who’s missing?”  
“Oh, uh..” He looks at the seat, and then toward the doorway, wondering. “Gluttony usually.. helps Father with food things, so I..th-think it’s Envy.”  
“Well, let’s go wake him up then,” Pride suggests, a devious smile on his face. He shoots Wrath a mischievous look. “Better he wakes up now than later, wouldn’t you agree?”  
His face lights up at the idea of Pride’s invitation, and the free excuse to blow something up. The two of them get up from their chairs, Wrath nearly jumping out, and Pride makes a last call. “Would anyone else like to join us?”  
Greed looks to Sloth, napping away. Pride scoffs at Greed for even thinking about it, turns around and starts heading for the staircase. Wrath follows his tail closely.  
Greed looks like he wants to take his noose off and tighten it around Pride’s neck.  
“I can’t stand that son of a bitch. He’s like the king of assholes.”  
“He has a point, you know,” Lust defends him, “Sloth isn’t very-”  
“Don’t know what he is, don’t care what he is.”  
Lust stops talking, and stares at Sloth instead. Not a great way to get your appetite working.  
Greed puts his feet up on the table. “What are they even making that’s takin’ so long? A five star omelette? _I’m dyin’ over here, dammit_.” Greed has the patience of a sugar-deprived toddler, but sometimes, we all feel like sugar-deprived toddlers.

To the surprise of most of us (except Sloth, can't be surprised when you're sleeping), an explosion rings off upstairs. It sounds eerily close to Envy’s room. “Looks like they pulled through with it,” Greed speaks with a tinge of surprise.  
Pride comes running down the stairs, giggling like a child. “Just wait,” Pride pants out, “It’ll be priceless.”  
Greed doesn’t look convinced. I just keep thinking about the footsteps I heard in my sleep last night. I really should stop thinking about it, but I can't.  
But we did wait, for what felt like ten minutes. Another explosion, and culprit number two starts rushing down. Just as Wrath comes sprinting back in:  
“ **What the hell** -”  
And another one. Envy screams, and then groans.  
“ _ **Okay, okay! I’m awake! Christ on the cross**_!”  
Everyone reacts; the two clean-cut pranksters burst out laughing immediately, with Pride having the dignity to sit up and slap the table; Wrath, on the other hand, was wheezing and rolling on the floor. Lust laughs and laughs along with them, like its the funniest thing in the world to her. Sloth lifts his head up and looks at the commotion, but doesn’t say anything. Greed shrugs, now looking impressed, but not wanting to give Pride validation. I grin at him.  
After the initial euphoria, everyone hushes up and waited for Envy to come downstairs. When he does, he's covered in soot from the waist down. Usually, he grins from cheek to cheek; not on this lovely morning. His arms are crossed, and he’s giving a death stare to two people at once.  
“Oh, come on,” Pride reasons with him before he can say a word, “you weren’t waking up at the normal time!” He pulls Wrath up off the floor, brushes him off and presents him to Envy. “If you’re looking for anyone to blame for that, it’s him!”  
Wrath is dumbstruck by the lie. “N-no I didn’t! Aren’t you the.. the one that suggested we go wake him up like that?”  
“You’re the one that laid the-”  
“I don’t care which one of you started it,” Envy cuts them off, “I just need to get these post-fire flakes cleaned off of me, they’re _disgusting_. What time is it, anyway?”  
“The end of the world. Go look at the hallway clock yourself, you can walk.”  
Envy makes a face at him and obliges. “8:52. Meh, could be worse.”  
I’ve been waiting for breakfast for 30 minutes. Everyone else? Who knows. At this point, I suspect Gluttony had eaten it and was trying again, but Satan would’ve slapped him some and more if he did. And we all would’ve heard it.  
I feel like I’m on the verge of breaking down the door at that point just to smell food.  
And then, after what feels like an eternity just for some breakfast, the magic person (and goat) step out to speak the magic words:  
“Breakfast is finally done!”  
Sloth hears “breakfast” and immediately snaps awake.


	4. Family Sitcom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Satan household finally gets a good breakfast for the day. The events that play out afterward are the opposite of good.

After the entrance of the morning meal, things got less chaotic. Envy left to clean the soot-covered makeover given to him by Pride and Wrath, and everyone began ravenously devouring the goods (as usual). After just a few minutes, I start to feel sick, thanks to overdoing the binge of grain, protein and fruit (both solid and liquid) in my mouth. It hurts, but it's a good distraction from that kid.

Nobody does much else besides enjoy breakfast, until Envy comes back into the dining room a few minutes later, looking shinier than a scrubbed-up baby. He rubs his freshly cleaned head, takes a quick look at the food on the table, and has a sour look on his face almost immediately.

“It took you until 8:55 to make a couple of sausages, fruit juice, scrambled eggs and pastries?”   
Gluttony coughs before taking a swig of cranberry juice. “First of all, we started at-”   
“Well, the sausages and eggs were no problem,” Satan interrupts him, “but getting the kolach right was a true agony to deal with. Choosing the fruit was simple,” he waves a hand towards Gluttony, “we both decided on blueberries. Then came the dough, and we overcooked it more times than I’m comfortable discussing..”

I never got over Father being a baking and cooking enthusiast, and a look at Envy shows I’m not alone on finding the entire concept funny. I’d throw in a guess that Gluttony’s the only one besides Satan that even knows what a kolach is.

“Yeah, that’s great,” Envy brushes off his baking speech, “but does it taste good?”

Pride’s done with his food at this point, so he looks towards Envy, smiles and makes a funny looking gesture with his hands. “Very.”

“Only way it could’ve been better is if you went with strawberries instead,” Lust mutters.

Satan’s ears perk up. “What was that, my dear?”   
“Nothing,” she hides the remark and keeps eating.

“We wouldn’t be eatin’ it like this if it wasn’t good,” Greed adds more audibly, still in the middle of chewing his eggs. “Right, Blue?”

It takes me a second to swallow the kolach crust. By the time I pipe up, Envy's sitting in his spot and trying out the food with Wrath.

“Yeah. Well, uh.. we were all pretty hungry, so I can’t really blame him for wondering if we weren’t just desperate to eat anything.”   
“Always you with the observations,” he replies. I can’t tell if he’s frustrated or impressed with me. Envy turns towards Wrath says something, but I wasn’t really listening in at that point.

Nothing else is said or done at the table after that, so my brain decides to make noise on the inside while I'm looking busy on the outside. I direct faux attention towards the half eaten kolach on my plate.

_ I’m trying to forget about that little crying kid. _

Poking at the cooked pastry grains.

_ It’d be way easier if I’d just blank him out of my head, huh? _

Gently prodding the fork ends into the fruity bits.

_ Just can’t do it. Can’t. _

Jabbing the fork into the blueberry paste.

_ Why not? It’s just a dream. Not like dreams matter or anything. _

Twist it.

_ They don’t. Dreams don’t matter. _

Take out a piece. Just a dash of it.

_ So why won’t it get out of my head? _

Eat. Eat. Eat.

_ Good food doesn’t distract bad thoughts. I should know better. _

It’s good to eat. Gluttony and Satan would appreciate it.

_ Not like that they won’t I look out of my mind. _

Who cares? Just keep going. Just keep on going.

_ Stop it. _

Still haven’t come up with who cares, huh?

_ They do, idiot. Just look around you. _

Somebody touches my shoulder.

“Hey, Blue?”

I do the closest thing to blinking I can. Holding my head up, I see pairs of eyes. I don’t feel like looking at them, so I look to the right instead. Towards whoever’s touching me.

Greed. As soon as I notice, he quickly removes his hand, switching back to his usual demeanor with an awkward cough.

“You don’t look so hot, buddy.”

I sit there, still out of it. “What? What do you mean?”

“You’ve been pretty stoic all morning,” Lust gleans, “even with how you usually are, it’s not normal for you to have damn near nothin’ to say or do. And here you are, looking like this. What’s the matter? Did you not sleep very well?”

I guess they noticed.

“I didn’t, but it’s not really worth talking about,” I spit out defensively.

I have to diffuse it, or I'll have no choice but to spill what I saw and felt last night. Not like they'd refuse to call me a basket case for being this bothered by something my brain made up.

“It may be partly my doing,” Satan admits, “as I did have him wake up early this morning.”

Pride and Lust’s nosiness goes off. “For what?”

“I will speak of it later. What it was is not the point, what is the point is that you were up dreadfully early to start with.” He twirls his fork, something a mere mortal would never see The Devil do. “An interrupted sleep is not a good one.”

I have no idea what they were trying to tell me, but I don’t like it.

  
Pride decides all family talks need his advice, and drops in his two cents. 

“Do you two have any idea what time it is right now? If he were to go back to sleep,” he points an index finger at me, “he would be up even later into the night. The only thing you would accomplish is messing his sleep schedule up, maybe even to the point where he becomes a day-sleeper. Essentially, more of a corpse than he already is.”

I hate to say that Pride has a point, but he does.

Lust doesn’t have a response to that. Satan looks as if he’s about to say something, but he changes his mind, keeping his mouth shut.

Gluttony decides to respond in their place.“Is a nap really that harmful to his sleep schedule? I mean, take a look-see at Sloth! He naps all the time, and he’s still here at the table like it’s nothing!”   
Sloth hears his name and holds his head up. “Wuh?”   
“No clue what you’re trying to say, since Sloth dozes off better than he breathes,” Pride utters with contempt, “but thank you for saying something intelligible.”   
Gluttony sinks into his chair. Sloth turns back around, looking ready to fall back asleep.   
“As I was saying, more rest wouldn’t be the solution for him. We need to find the root cause of his sleeplessness first.” 

The gears in his brain finally click. You can see it in his eyes. 

“Perhaps the issue was  _ in _ his sleep?” 

He looks at me, almost tilting his head in consideration; Satan does something similar. I say and do nothing.

“I didn’t know I signed up for a therapy session,” Greed throws in before rubbing his eyes, “but I want out. Hearing you people talk like this makes me want to go back to bed. Can’t we just finish up with breakfast and go do our thing?”

Pride scoffs.“Typical of you to leave problems in suspension so you can go do what you want, hm?”   
Greed pushes himself away from the table, stands up from his chair, and starts heading to the doorless exit. “Yeah.”   
He leaves the room.

Pride looks on at Greed's absence in accomplishment. “So, as I was saying, let’s come up with some-”   
“Pride.”

He shuts up.

“Thank you for attempting to steer the conversation, Satan says quietly, “but I do believe you’ve spoken enough for the day. Now, allow me to take over, or you won’t continue on with this much longer.”   
Immediately, Pride looks smaller. Not a word from anybody else.

“Forgive my silence up until now,” The Devil continues, “but this discussion has evolved beyond casual concern, and shouldn’t be playing out so publicly.” He shoots a look at the defeated Pride, standing up. “ I can sense Blue’s discomfort from here, so I shall speak with him. Alone.”

My brain freezes. Not a fan of prolonging the inevitable, Satan heads to the exit. He stops, just to beckon me. “Come along, my child.” 

I slowly get up from my chair and follow him. He leads me to the leftmost room, going on until we're in the same room from this morning; his personal lair.

The obsidian rock floor and chairs are in the same condition as when I went in last time. Part of me wants to find that newspaper Satan was reading so I can hide my face while we talk, but it’s guaranteed long gone by now. And I'd look crazier.

“Have a seat.” He notices my lack of enthusiasm, and gives me a smile. “This isn’t a punishment, my child. I just want to help you.”   
Despite fearing for my life, I take a seat. He does the same, but in his specially made throne-like chair. He’s a big guy, but having to explain yourself makes whoever you’re talking to look even bigger.

He lets out an _ahem_ as he gets cozy in his chair.

“Now, with all of that out of the way; what is it that bothers you so terribly?”

I don’t want to look at him, so I try my best not to.

“I..”   
Not wanting to soothe my fear of eye contact, he keeps on looking at me, waiting for a reply. I give him an honest one.

“Well.. I had a nightmare. Last night.”   
Surprisingly, Satan has no issue with that response. “About what, my boy?”

Here goes nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait! Bet you thought it ended right there, huh?  
> Don't you worry, there's more to come after this. School started up, so updates could be slow, but regardless of pain, I'll avoid hiatus as much as possible. Have a good day!


	5. Little Merchant Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobby Blue gets commercial.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember when I said there wouldn’t be any more hiatuses?

By the time I finish talking and leave Dad’s lair, everyone else had already left. They’re always happy to get the rest of the day over with, especially after weird shit like that. Can’t blame ‘em.  
All of us have set responsibilities that have to be done on a daily basis, but the only one that I can say has a traditional job (besides Satan, punisher of the damned) is Greed. He takes care of the shopping needs for the residents of Hell. His shop operates in almost every level of the underworld, even that weird dungeon way above us with nothing but flies, spiders and barely sentient Gapers; I can’t complain, it’s the best place to get assigned guard duty.  
Nobody knows exactly where Greed gets some of the more extravagant things for his shop (when he has them, anyway), but he doesn’t tell, and we don’t question his methods. Ever.  
I decide to pay him a visit.

Greed makes his shop more exclusive by locking the door up. People try bribing him to open the door with juicy hearts, bombs, sex and everything else that’s not a key to open a lock, but he says it doesn’t matter to him; all he takes is keys to open his door. No exceptions. There’s no sibling bonuses, so there goes one of my keys.  
He’s hung from the ceiling, as if he’s dead in a private gibbet. Anyone that’s tried to rob him knows for sure that he’s more than alive. Looks like he’s napping instead of just being stationary, though. Slacking off on the job. I give the wall behind me a few raps.  
“Greed?”  
He turns his head towards the noise, blinking when he realizes whose saying his name. He rubs his empty eyesockets. After the surprise of a sibling visit leaves him, he tells me, “Blue, I told ya that weird family therapy sessions make me wanna go back to sleep.”  
He looks up at the rope suspending him in the air.  
“Uh.. how about cutting me down from here? I don’t feel like swinging up here anymore, hard to talk to ‘ya like this.”

There’s nothing pressing at the moment, so we hang out behind the market selection. The shop’s fully stocked, but still modest: A glass jar, a set of bombs, a key, and a load of red hearts, five of them. The jar’s the most expensive thing there at fifteen cents, while everything else varies between three to five cents a pop. Not a bad deal, for an average day.  
No time for talking, the first customer of the day shows up; a little devil beggar, probably tired of pretending to not have enough hearts. The key crumbles after the door opens; it's almost as big as him, but he makes up for his size in sheer speed. Greed can barely stand up and make himself official-looking before the beggar’s right in front of him almost immediately. I think Greed’s used to it though.  
“Welcome to my emporium!” Greed says with confidence despite having only four things up for sale. “What can I get ya?”  
The beggar doesn’t bother to speak. He points and makes a cooing noise towards the red hearts, staring at them.  
“Goin’ with the red hearts, huh? Those’re a real classic. How many do-”  
The beggar scooches closer, extends his arms and grabs all five hearts. He looks at Greed and coos for a second time, now with the widest possible grin on his face. It’s surprisingly adorable for a demonic vagrant.  
“..All five of ‘em,”  
The devil beggar nods, still grinning.  
“..No problem,” Greed says, “that’ll be twenty-five cents.”  
The beggar pulls a pouch of money out of his flesh-pocket. Greed opens the pouch to count up the money, does something with a wrinkled piece of paper and approves the purchase. The devil beggar takes his spoils and runs out the door, laughing all the way.  
Right after that display, Greed runs to the entrance and locks it back up again.  
“Lost my daily stock of reds in one go,” he mutters with a mix of impressment and disappointment. “I need to learn to add some extra stock to cover for those damned little beggars, they take ‘em all.. He shook his head. “Whatever. I got some good money already.”  
The beggar’s laughter is muffled now. A few seconds later, I can’t hear it.  
Greed folds up the paper he was holding, placing it in a flesh-pocket. He goes back to where he was (next to me) and sits down again, getting comfortable even without much cushioning.  
“So what happened after I left?”  
Straight to the point.  
“Well, Satan ended up talking to me-”  
“Wait, wasn’t he already doin’ that?”  
“No, not with everyone else like before you left,” I acknowledge the interruption. “Just me.”  
His expression twists. “Well shit. Did anything weird go down in there?” Greed looks at my face and neck. “He didn’t hurt ya either, did he?  
I think for a second before talking. “No, not really. But yeah, it was pretty weird. Pride got his ego damaged into shutting up.”  
Greed’s twisted face of concern turns smug when he hears that. “Those dumbasses don’t do it often enough. Who?”  
“Dad.”  
His face grows significantly more smug, with a tinge of surprise. “Good. I hate that mealy bastard with every inch of flesh on my body.”  
“Trust me,” I tell him. “I know for a fact that you do.”  
Greed chuckles, then remembers what we’re talking about. “Okay then, what else about Satan?”  
“He took me into his office after Pride was deflated, then he told me to spill it. I don’t know how or why, but I did.” I look down at my hands. “Then he started asking me questions.”  
“Like what?”  
I hold my legs. “Asking me what things in my dream looked like, what I felt during it, how I felt after I woke up.. stuff like that,” I explained. “He.. was oddly focused on what I was saying.”  
“Like how?”  
“He looked like.. like he just learned something big when he sent me out of his office, as if I just told him the answer to the million dollar question. All lost in thought.” I let go of my legs. “I don’t know why he was so interested, it’s not normal for him.”  
“Well, you did care an awful lot about it, too,” Greed reminds me. “Remember how you were aggressively eatin’ that pastry thing over that dream? You looked like you were goin’ through a void the entire time. I thought it was just the pastry tasting like shit, but that wasn’t it.”  
I don’t say anything. Greed elbows me.  
“Because it was fuckin’ delicious,” he says in a strange tone, as if he’s trying to get a laugh out of me. I don’t laugh.  
“..Tell you what,” Greed starts. “Since you’ve been having a shitty day so far, I’ll let you be my assistant for today, like a take your sibling to work kinda thing. When a customer shows up ‘n leaves, lock the door so I don’t have to get up, it’s a major pain in my ass. Or you can beat up anyone that tries robbin’ my store, I’d appreciate that too.”  
There’s a smile on my face. “Thanks. What about my regular job, though?”  
“Screw it. Satan barely checks on anyone that deals with newbies anyway.” He hears the sound of someone trying to open the door, so he gets up and makes himself more presentable. “Those damned-to-Sheol souls can wait just one day.”

Wait they did.  
By the time the day ends, the natural light in the room starts to go. I follow Greed back to the house, thinking about how to avoid Dad and my other siblings.  
“I have no clue what Gluttony and Satan are making for dinner,” Greed says, “but it better be edible. Every time they try ‘n touch any kind of meat, it almost always comes out shitty.”  
“Yep,” I answer him. “Good thing I won’t have to worry about what we’re eating tonight.”  
“Because you’re goin’ to sleep early?”  
I nod.  
“You were having vivid nightmares last night, and now you feel like sleepin’ early? You’re one brave bastard, aren’t you?”  
“No, I just want to be left alone for the night,” I explain to him. “It was hard enough this morning.”  
“I get it, I feel like avoidin’ family at least once every day. I can’t judge.” He yawns and stretches his arms as he comes to a stop, straining the stitches in his mouth and face. “I’d join, but I could eat a horse for dinner right now.”  
We’re right in front of the steps to the door, and I can hear the bustle from here. Part of me just wants to sleep outside instead of going inside, but I know I can’t do that. Sloth is second to Envy with improvising sleep locations, and I’m a solid fifth-placer.  
“Looks like the party’s already gettin’ started,” Greed looks at me with a grin. “You sure you wanna go to sleep early, dude?”  
No thought needed for this one. “Yeah.”  
“Suit yourself,” Greed shrugs and opens the door. He goes in before I do, so I follow him in before the door closes on me.  
Right after coming inside, its clear where the bustle is coming from:  
“I’m gonna ask you guys again, and this time y’all are gonna TELL me: Which one of you ate the food from my minifridge?!”  
Greed looks back at me, shines another grin and follows the voice into the living room. He’s greedy for anything in life, even things like this. After he’s more or less disappeared, I start walking.  
Another voice comes up while I’m doing that:  
“You sure you didn’t forget about it after going in another food coma, fatty?”  
“Lust, I told you not to call me that! How would you like it if I called you a.. a huge sleazeball or somethin‘?”  
“I.. th-think she’d like that, Gluttony.”  
A short silence follows. I hear someone snicker. I walk faster.  
I can feel Lust’s eyelashes fluttering when she says, “You meant to say slut, right? Yeah, I would like that. Why don’t you guys start calling me that more often, from this night on?”  
“If that’s what you want.”  
I can’t walk fast enough, can I?


End file.
